Eastern Europe/Ukraine

member_28502 · Post by **member_28502** » 12 Mar 2014 05:32

While it is good to be bipolar in world affairs ( if not for Lithium and Zoloft in real life) The reality will be Tri_polar .
USA Russia and PRC ( the NAM place apportioned by PRC for want of India leadership)
I see such a development a deterrent against rash actions by US EU combo.

Philip · Post by **Philip** » 12 Mar 2014 07:13

Crimea parliament declares independence from Ukraine ahead of referendum
Published time: March 11, 2014
http://rt.com/news/crimea-parliament-in ... raine-086/

If the referendum is in favor, the Crimean authorities will request for their country to become a constituent republic of the Russian Federation.

The declaration was signed by the speaker of the Supreme Council of Crimea, Vladimir Konstantinov, and the head of the Sevastopol City Council, Yury Doynikov.

“We adopted the declaration of independence to make the upcoming referendum legitimate and transparent,” Konstantinov said.

“Now we declare ourselves the Republic of Crimea, we don’t add ‘autonomous."

After Tuesday’s declaration of independence, Crimea will never rejoin Ukraine, Konstantinov added.

“Crimea won’t be a part of Ukraine even if the ousted president, Viktor Yanukovich, returns to power,” he said. “The country where we lived doesn’t exist anymore. We are going our own way and we’re trying to do it quickly.”

Konstantinov said that Crimea will adopt the Russian ruble as its currency soon after the referendum.

Meanwhile, Crimean authorities are preparing for Sunday’s poll, says the speaker of the Supreme Council of Crimea. He reiterated that he believes the referendum will be passed.

“The ballots for the referendum are being printed and the election committees are being formed in all parts of Crimea," he says.

Seventy-seven percent of people in Crimea and Sevastopol will vote to join Russia in the March 16 referendum, according to the poll conducted by Crimea Republican Institute of Political and Sociological Research.

Eighty-five percent of people in Sevastopol, a city with a special status located on the Crimean peninsula, believe that it should join Russia.

According to the poll, 97 percent of the population of Sevastopol and Crimea negatively view the situation in Ukraine regarding the Kiev coup-imposed government, while 84 percent say that Ukraine is experiencing a crisis.

A total of 83 percent of the population of Crimea disapprove of the coup-appointed government in Kiev, the poll found.

Well known British commentator,Mathew Parris,has this excellent piece that puts the Ukrainian crisis in proper perspective.What he has left unsaid is why the West/NATO want the Ukraine ,is to militarise it into a forward missile base against Russia.It is the unrelenting policy ever since the Cold War ended for Western Cold War warriors to seize through street revolutions,control of former Warsaw pact nations and use them against Riussia.

http://www.spectator.co.uk/columnists/m ... -russians/
Leave Ukraine to the Russians
We don't know what we're doing. So let's stop doing it

‘You can’t always get what you want,’ chorused Mick Jagger, ‘but if you try some time/You just might find/You get what you need.’ The danger with Ukraine is that the western powers will get what they want, not what we need.

I write this as one who has travelled in Ukraine, loved the country and seen that its people (though poor) are talented and energetic. Any reference I make to basket cases refers to the Ukrainian state, not the country’s human resources. What we say we want is for Russia to withdraw from Crimea and turn away from the rest of the country too, which we hope to take under the West’s wing. There follow three good reasons why such an outcome, should we get it, might not be what we need.

First (as Sir Christopher Meyer argued in the Times this week), Russian sentiment over the Crimea runs deep: deeper than some idle pretext for a power grab, and rooted in the Russian imagination. As is often remarked, Russia’s loss of this territory happened as late as 1954 and at the time was neither intended nor interpreted as a ceding of sovereignty, because Ukraine was then so firmly under the Soviet heel as to be essentially a Russian possession. It was really only after the dissolution of the USSR, when Ukraine began to drift (marginally) away from Moscow’s control, that the full significance of the redrawing of boundaries (for essentially administrative reasons) was brought home to Russians within and outside Ukraine.

This year that drift looked like gathering pace. Last month on the streets of Kiev it brought open rupture. The fresh elections that had been agreed (with EU involvement) only hours before what was tantamount to a mob-instigated coup, would have brought time to negotiate the future status of the home port of Russia’s vital Black Sea fleet and the Russian-speaking people in Crimea. All at once, Moscow faced a fait accompli.

I submit that the response — effectively to occupy the Crimea — has been proportionate and understandable. For external powers like America and the EU to try to thwart this and pressure Moscow into a retreat would look to me (were I Russian) like an intolerable interference. Anyway, it would fail. Unless Moscow ends up with effective control over Crimea, or at least rock-solid and reliable influence, we in the West will by our stance have engendered deep and lasting resentment in Moscow without any comparable gain for ourselves.

Secondly, I would go further than concede the Crimea to Moscow. I would also hesitate before giving any appearance of a readiness to take the rest of Ukraine under the wing of the West. Politically and economically the country is a basket case, and for Moscow an expensive one.

When I travelled about a decade ago in Ukraine I gained the impression of a big and weighty — not to say monumental — state superstructure resting upon the spindly props of an agricultural sector primitive to the point (in parts) of subsistence farming; and industry, mining and infrastructure composed of inefficient rust-belt mid-20th-century post-Soviet monoliths that any liberal free-market government would have to endure a couple of decades’ massive pain and protest to close down. Retail and commerce looked stuck way back in the last century. There was little sense of competitiveness. Millions would need to be sacked and huge disruption wreaked upon citizens’ lives before any kind of corner was turned. Consider what unexpected difficulty West Germany had in digesting East Germany — and remember that East Germany was one of the former Soviet Union’s most advanced economies; Ukraine was (and remains) one of its least. Britain’s brutal 1980s Thatcherite revolution would seem a tea-party by comparison.

Western commentary has spoken sunnily about the need to ‘secure’ the Ukrainian economy by means of loans — as if Western help were some kind of investment, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to buy a stake in a potential modern European country. But it would not be an investment; no loan, however large or on however generous terms, would fix the problem. Ukraine has come to rely on massive subsidy. Russia has historically provided this. Why should we be panting to take the burden upon our own shoulders?

The task may be onerous, the cost tremendous and the timescale long, but idealists and neoconservatives might still argue that if we could finally bring about the creation of a liberal, free-market democracy in one of the world’s biggest countries, then the challenge would be worth shouldering.

But I doubt — and this is my third argument — that transformed national cultures can be created by external subsidy, training or intervention. If this is really the Ukrainian spring, we should ask ourselves how the Arab spring, the Iraqi spring or the Syrian spring are working out. Experience is not encouraging.

I support — we all should — those forces in Ukraine who want to throw off autocracy and corruption and embrace modern democracy. But I don’t know — do you? — how strong or potentially united they are, what parts of the Ukrainian population they represent, or what calibre of leadership they can look to. I didn’t easily, when I visited, see it happening fast. If it can, if it does, I suspect this had better be home-grown, and fought for, rather than imported.

We do an idealistic, fragmented and perhaps immature movement for democratic values no good by adopting national postures that seem to offer the reformists material support as well as external cheerleading when the going gets tough. We made that mistake after the first Gulf war when many reformist Iraqis, encouraged to break cover, died as a consequence. The West should take care not to put its mouth where its money isn’t, as we once did in Hungary.

Do we understand what we’re doing here? You know the answer to that. I rest my case.

This article first appeared in the print edition of The Spectator magazine, dated 8 March 2014 & 8 March 2014

Philip · Post by **Philip** » 12 Mar 2014 07:45

Will the Kiev clique try and disrupt the Crimean referendum on Sunday? It appears from its :ultimatum" to the new Crimean govt. that some mischief is being planned,which is coinciding with NATO exercises in Poland Western mercenaries who were instigating the street demos in Kiev may have infiltrated some parts of the Crimea to carry out acts of sabotage and disrupt polling.This is hopefully to give the US/West the fig leaf of trashing the referendum result which in all likelihood will be an overwhelming desire to unite the Crimea with Russia.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/m ... referendum
Ukraine parliament delivers ultimatum to Crimea over referendum
Crimean assembly told to call off independence referendum or face dissolution, as US attempts at diplomacy stall

vic · Post by **vic** » 12 Mar 2014 08:31

I wa reading open source information about Gas supplies through Ukriane. It seems that even if all the supplies through Ukraine are cut off, there will not be any effect on the rest of the world for upto 2 years. By that time south stream pipeline will also start.

I think after annexing crimea, Russia should let west fund Ukriane for couple of years and then after they have suffered adequate pain, break off bits of east Ukriane into autonomous regions.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 12 Mar 2014 08:32

Ex-German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder Blames EU's "Mistaken" Policy For Crimea Situation

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 12 Mar 2014 08:33

vic wrote:I wa reading open source information about Gas supplies through Ukriane. It seems that even if all the supplies through Ukraine are cut off, there will not be any effect on the rest of the world for upto 2 years. By that time south stream pipeline will also start.

I think after annexing crimea, Russia should let west fund Ukriane for couple of years and then after they have suffered adequate pain, break off bits of east Ukriane into autonomous regions.

The current Ukraine Government is hand chosen by the West , they would never close the tap for pipes that passes through their country. Ukraine also earns money from pipeline passing through their land.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 12 Mar 2014 14:52

The Ukraine, The War Party and the Pentagon’s Swamp of Waste

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 12 Mar 2014 15:52

Fareed Zakaria - UKRAINE IN CRISIS explained

Philip · Post by **Philip** » 12 Mar 2014 19:13

The KIev clique throws in the towel! Won't/can't send troops to the Crimea! Sh*tting bricks in fear of the eastern part of Ukraine also defecting to Russia.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/m ... -president

Ukraine president: Kiev will not use army to stop Crimea secession
Oleksandr Turchynov says intervention would leave Ukraine exposed in the east, where Russia has 'significant tank units'

Ukraine president: Kiev will not use army to stop Crimea secession
Oleksandr Turchynov says intervention would leave Ukraine exposed in the east, where Russia has 'significant tank units'

Nicholas Watt and agencies
theguardian.com, Wednesday 12 March 2014 13.54 GMT

Oleksandr Turchynov said Russia was 'provoking us to have a pretext to intervene on the Ukrainian mainland'. Photograph: ITAR-TASS /Barcroft Media

Ukraine's acting president has said the country will not use its army to stop Crimea from seceding, in the latest indication that a Russian annexation of the peninsula may be imminent.

The interim leader said intervening on the south-eastern Black Sea peninsula, where Kremlin-backed forces have seized control, would leave Ukraine exposed on its eastern border, where he said Russia has massed "significant tank units".

"We cannot launch a military operation in Crimea, as we would expose the eastern border and Ukraine would not be protected," Oleksandr Turchynov told Agence France-Presse.

"They're provoking us to have a pretext to intervene on the Ukrainian mainland … [but] we cannot follow the scenario written by the Kremlin."

Crimea is due to hold a referendum on joining Russia this Sunday, organised by the peninsula's self-appointed leaders.

Turchynov described the secession referendum as a sham whose outcome would be decided "in the offices of the Kremlin".

The European Union is poised to impose travel bans and to freeze the assets of Russian officials and military officers involved in the occupation of Crimea by next Monday if Moscow declines to accept the formation of a "contact group" to establish a dialogue with Ukraine.

But Russian leaders are currently refusing to communicate with Ukraine and refuse to accept Turchynov's legitimacy.

"Unfortunately, for now Russia is rejecting a diplomatic solution to the conflict," he said.

A meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels on Monday is being seen as an unofficial deadline for the introduction of the sanctions, which would exempt the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, and his foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, as the EU tries to keep open lines of communication.

Ukraine's parliament warned the regional assembly in Crimea on Tuesday that it faces dissolution unless it cancels the referendum, which has been condemned by the EU and the US as illegal. But the Russian foreign ministry said it would respect the result of the vote.

On Wednesday, a Russian court issued an arrest warrant for Ukrainian far-right leader Dmytro Yarosh in absentia on charges of inciting terrorism – a symbolic move in support of Moscow's argument that "extremists" stole power in neighbouring Ukraine.

Russian news agencies said Moscow's Basmanny district court ruled that Yarosh – one of the most influential leaders of the protest movement which ousted former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovich – should be arrested for making "public calls for terrorist and extremist activities via the media".

Ukraine's new justice authorities have issued warrants for the arrest of pro-Russia leaders in the Crimea region.

EU sanctions against Moscow are what leaders describe as phase II of a three-stage plan that would involve curbs on energy, trade and financial relations if Russian forces move beyond Crimea to the main part of eastern Ukraine.

David Cameron's spokesman said: "The prime minister is very much linking phase II to the need for dialogue to start in the next few days. We are asking [the officials] to do preparatory work and we still believe there is an opportunity for the dialogue to start and we very much encourage the Russian authorities to start that.

"The focus [of the sanctions will] be on officials who are closely linked to infringements on Ukrainian sovereignty."

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 12 Mar 2014 19:32

Ukraine parliament delivers ultimatum to Crimea over referendum

Ukraine not to use army to enforce Crimea...

Sounds like they have taken classes in Nai Dilli from (never mind).

panduranghari · Post by **panduranghari** » 12 Mar 2014 19:49

Code: Select all

http://kunstler.com/******-nation/deep-state-descending/

And so it’s back to the Kardashians for the US of ADD. As of Sunday The New York Times kicked Ukraine off its front page, a sure sign that the establishment (let’s revive that useful word) is sensitive to the growing ridicule over its claims of national interest in that floundering, bedraggled crypto-nation. The Kardashians sound enough like one of the central Asian ethnic groups battling over the Crimea lo these many centuries — Circassians, Meskhetian Turkmen, Tatars, Karachay-Cherkessians — so the sore-beset American public must be content that they’re getting the news-of-the-world. Perhaps one of those groups was once led by a Great Kanye.

Secretary of State John Kerry has shut his pie-hole, too, for the moment, as it becomes more obvious that Ukraine happens to be Russia’s headache (and neighbor). The playbook of great nations is going obsolete in this new era of great nations having, by necessity, to become smaller broken-up nations. It could easily happen in the USA too as our grandiose Deep State descends further into incompetence, irrelevance, buffoonery, and practical bankruptcy.

Theories abound about what drives this crisis and all the credible stories revolve around the question of natural gas. I go a little further, actually, and say that the specter of declining energy sources worldwide is behind this particular eruption of disorder in one sad corner of the globe and that we’re sure to see more symptoms of that same basic problem in one country after another from here on, moving from the political margins to the centers. The world is out of cheap oil and gas and, at the same time, out of capital to produce the non-cheap oil and gas. So what’s going on is a scramble between desperate producers and populations worried about shivering in the dark. The Ukraine is just a threadbare carpet-runner between them.

Contributing to our own country’s excessive vanity in the arena of nations is the mistaken belief that we have so much shale gas of our own that we barely know what to do with it. This is certainly the view, for instance, of Speaker of the House John Boehner, who complained last week about bureaucratic barriers to the building of new natural gas export terminals, with the idea that we could easily take over the European gas market from Russia. Boehner is out of his mind. Does he not know that the early big American shale gas plays (Barnett in Texas, Haynesville in Louisiana, Fayettville in Arkansas) are already winding down after just ten years of production? That’s on top of the growing austerity in available capital for the so-far-unprofitable shale gas industry. That’s on top of the scarcity of capital for building new liquid natural gas terminals and ditto the fleet of specialized refrigerated tanker ships required to haul the stuff across the ocean. File under “not going to happen.”

Even the idea that we will have enough natural gas for our own needs in the USA beyond the short term ought to be viewed with skepticism. What happens, for instance, when we finally realize that it costs more to frack it out of the ground than people can pay for it? I’ll tell you exactly what will happen: the gas will remain underground bound up in its “tight rock,” possibly forever, and a lot of Americans will freeze to death.

The most amazing part of the current story is that US political leaders are so ignorant of the facts. They apparently look only to the public relations officers in the oil-and-gas industries and no further. Does Barack Obama still believe, as he said in 2011, that we have a hundred years of shale gas?” That was just something that a flack from the Chesapeake Corporation told to some White House aide over a bottle of Lalou Bize-Leroy Domaine d’Auvenay Les Bonnes-Mares Grand Cru. Government officials believe similar fairy tales about shale oil from the Bakken in North Dakota — a way overhyped resource play likely to pass its own peak at the end of this year.

If you travel around the upper Hudson Valley, north of Albany, where I live, you would see towns and landscapes every bit as desolate as a former Soviet republic. In fact, our towns look infinitely worse than the street-views of Ukraine’s population centers. Ours were built of glue and vinyl, with most of the work completed thirty years ago so that it’s all delaminating under a yellow-gray patina of auto emissions. Inside these miserable structures, American citizens with no prospects and no hope huddle around electric space heaters. They have no idea how they’re going to pay the bill for that come April. They already spent the money on tattoos and heroin.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 12 Mar 2014 21:20

Norman Davies in his book "Europe's Vanished States" gives an account of all the states that were there in Europe and how they rose and later vanished. The key point is the geography and the people didn't vanish. The idea of the state vanished as it no longer had support for the idea.
Misfortunately since the idea of Westphalian nation-state came about to stop the religious wars after the Thirty year war in Europe and the creation of United nations after World War II, there is a notion that states are permanent. This begs the question then how come we have so many countries in the UN and only 5 permanent members. Even there Russia the main successor state of Soviet Union had many states spun off from it and Britain and France have lost many of their colonies that in aggregate contributed to their weight in international relations.

So its all maya only. Nothing is saswath!

As the poet says in Ozymandias this too shall pass.

member_28352 · Post by **member_28352** » 12 Mar 2014 21:37

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB1 ... 17460.html

Poland and Germany threatening Russia to join contact group or else....
I'm so afraid that I'll drink vodka and hide in my sarafan.

Jokes apart I hope the Poles are exposed as the braggarts that they are. Western Ukraine is for most practical purposes a Poland-lite.

Yogi_G · Post by **Yogi_G** » 13 Mar 2014 07:49

Kasparov is an absolute leech and far worse than our Salman Khurshid. This chap has gone too far and is now openly a western agent. Putin treats him like the donkey he is. This chap's mouth would not shut even after Kramnik crushed him completely in 2000. What a megalomaniac.

vic · Post by **vic** » 13 Mar 2014 07:52

Austin wrote:
vic wrote:I wa reading open source information about Gas supplies through Ukriane. It seems that even if all the supplies through Ukraine are cut off, there will not be any effect on the rest of the world for upto 2 years. By that time south stream pipeline will also start.

I think after annexing crimea, Russia should let west fund Ukriane for couple of years and then after they have suffered adequate pain, break off bits of east Ukriane into autonomous regions.
The current Ukraine Government is hand chosen by the West , they would never close the tap for pipes that passes through their country. Ukraine also earns money from pipeline passing through their land.

It would be Russia who would have to cut off Gas supplies as Ukriane will not pay it's Gas Bill which can be USD 0.5 to 2 Billion per month.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 13 Mar 2014 08:34

The west's do-somethings will do nothing for Ukraine

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 13 Mar 2014 08:39

Thom Hartmann talks with Stephen Cohen

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 13 Mar 2014 09:26

Ulyukayev: RF will have to reduce payments in dollars in the case of U.S. sanctions

"The degree of freedom of the American partners to apply some tough measures much more (than EU - Ed.). I think they did not have to go beyond the introduction of individual sanctions, if they go, it means complication of the system of international payments system of trade relations, payments. This means that we have to work those lines, we used to do - that is, to increase the volume of trade with countries that are calculated national currencies, "- said in an interview on Uljukaev" Russia 24 ".

"Why in the relationship with China, India, Turkey, we have contracted in dollars? Why do we need it? We have contracted in national currencies - this also applies to energy and other areas," - says the minister.

"First and foremost it should touch our oil and gas companies that they boldly walked for contracts in rubles and foreign currency of the partner country. I think that now there is an additional impetus to finally finalize this work", - concluded Uljukaev .

According to him, this also applies to reserve management, and investment cooperation: maximum focus on local currency, on the local financial system - this is the normal way.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 13 Mar 2014 09:49

Bill O'Reilly on Putin: 'Long Past Time to Deal With This Thug'

Counter-Point

Stephen F. Cohen, Ph.D. on O'Reilly claiming we're Putin bashing

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 13 Mar 2014 13:10

Ukraine’s ex-security chief accuses US, Poland of nipping peace effort in the bud (VOR )

The United States and Poland have played a force multiplier role in the Ukrainian coup, where Washington was reluctant to let the conflict de-escalate into a peaceful settlement. This is according to Ukraine’s former Security Chief Alexander Yakimenko. The United States and Poland have played a force multiplier role in the Ukrainian coup, where Washington was reluctant to let the conflict de-escalate into a peaceful settlement. This is according to Ukraine’s former Security Chief Alexander Yakimenko.

"At Maidan, there were several political parties and movements who then joined forces to build the Right Sector, plus Western patrons, of course," the former head of Ukraine’s National Security Service said in an interview with the Rossia 24 TV channel.

"Poland and the United States played a special role in it. Poland was represented by EU’s envoy in Ukraine [Jan Tadeusz] Tombiński. He is a national of Poland, which regards its participation in the EU, NATO and all manner of blocs and organizations as a means to boost its leverage."

Mr. Yakimenko said Poland “pulled every string,” using the EU and NATO as its vehicles to "subjugate Ukraine."

According to the disgraced security chief, Washington wasn’t content with EU's peace initiative in Ukraine. "They weren’t all too happy about EU’s intent to go ahead with peace negotiations and peace policy [in Ukraine]. They weren’t happy about the attitude of EU leaders and of [EU’s High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy] Catherine Ashton, who held talks with Yanukovych as the country’s legitimate president."

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 13 Mar 2014 13:13

Snipers shot people from buildings, controlled by Maidan protestors - Ukraine's ex-security chief (VOR)
http://voiceofrussia.com/news/2014_03_1 ... -bud-4446/

Snipers, who were killing people during the Euromaidan, were situated in the building of philharmonic society. At a point in time, the building was controlled by Andrey Parubiy, commandant of the Euromaidan, Alexander Yakimenko, former Head of the Security Service of Ukraine, told Rossiya 1 Russian TV channel. He thinks that Parubiy contacted with the US intelligence representatives.

"Snipers shot people from the building of philharmonic society, which was controlled by commandant Andrey Parubiy. These people attacked Ukrainian law enforcers, who were demoralized and fled, because snipers were shooting them," Alexander Yakimenko said.

"The law enforcers were chased by armed people with different types of arms. At the very moment, snipers began to shoot the pursuers. When the first wave of shootings ended, witnesses saw 20 people, leaving the building of philharmonic society. These people had a special uniform, cases for sniper rifles and the AKMs rifles. The fact is that not only law enforcers saw these people, but the Maidan protestors, including representative of Svoboda, Right Sector, Batkivshchyna and UDAR parties as well.

According to Yakimenko, during the massacre the opposition leaders contacted him and asked him to deploy special force unit to scoop out the snipers from buildings in central Kiev, but Parubiy made sure that won't happen.

"The Right Sector and Freedom Party have requested me to use the Alpha group to cleanse these buildings, stripping them from snipers," Yakimenko said. According to him Ukrainian troops were ready to move in and eliminate the shooters.

"I was ready to do it, but in order to go inside Maidan I had to get the sanction from Parubiy. Otherwise the 'self-defense' would attack me in the back. Parubiy did not give such consent," Yakimenko said noting that the Maidan leader had full authority over the access to weapons on Maidan, and not a single gun including a sniper rifle could get in or out of the square.

The latest developments in Ukraine were the result of an accelerated implementation by external forces, first of all, the United States, of a scenario that was to be used in the country in 2015 during presidential elections, the former head of the Ukrainian Security Service, Alexander Yakimenko, said in interview to Rossiya 24 Russian TV station.

He said Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich was out of favor in the West, adding that a number of countries were conducting work aimed at bringing to power representatives of other political forces at the 2015 presidential elections.

He said Western countries "flirted" with Yanukovich saying Europe was supporting him, and planned "to protract the negotiating process" for Kiev to sign an association agreement with the European Union "for Russia to help reinforce the social and political structure in Ukraine."

According to Yakimenko, this was done in order "to bring Ukraine to Europe for Russian money" later by replacing the Ukrainian president.

Ukrainian President Yanukovich left Ukraine in February after a coup in his country. He told reporters in southern Russia on Tuesday that he remained the legitimate Ukrainian leader despite "an anti-constitutional seizure of power by armed radicals." Russia considers Yanukovich the legitimate Ukrainian president.

The coup came on the wave of mass anti-government protests in Ukraine that started in November 2013 when the country's authorities refused to sign an association agreement with the EU at a Vilnius summit, opting for closer ties with Russia instead.

Yakimenko also said some representatives of the new Kiev authorities are now still actively implementing the will of their American patrons who "need a Ukraine that would fulfill what they believe necessary."

He said he believes the West will continue its policy aimed at destabilizing the situation in Ukraine's southeastern regions and then in Belarus and Kazakhstan.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 13 Mar 2014 13:16

Looking at these reports and Putins statement that Maidan Right Wing were trained in Poland and Lithuania.

It seems the entire Coup was planned at Langley with Active participant from Poland.

The rest of the EU crowd just got pulled and shepherded into the movement to do what is right for Democracy and EU etc

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 13 Mar 2014 21:48

Pictures of Americans and British NATO members training facists youth for Ukrainian putsch.

http://rossiyanavsegda.ru/read/1689/

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 13 Mar 2014 21:53

German media: Ultranationalists played a key role in Ukrainian coup

BERLIN, March 13, New government in Kiev is non-transparent and disconnected, and radical nationalists are gaining strength there, the German newspaper Der Tagesspiegel reported on Thursday.The article points out the far from unanimous Ukrainian opposition is now in power and underscores the role of the ultra-right Svoboda (Freedom) party in the overthrow. The opposition feels at home not only in Kiev, and this is not only about Vitali Klitschko “trained” in the Konrad Adenauer Centre, says the paper.

Der Tagesspiegel cites Svoboda’s links to the Hungarian Jobbik radical nationalist party (the Movement for a Better Hungary) and the far-right National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD). According to the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the global Jewish human rights organization, Svoboda’s leader is an overt anti-Semite, says the media. Yet the EU is going to give billions of aid to the country whose government is opaque and disconnected, points the article.

Far-right radicals played one of the key roles in the coup in Kiev, reported the German news agency DPA. The black and red flag is proudly fluttering above Independence Square in the centre of Kiev, the flag of Ukrainian nationalists and the symbol of an overthrow in the former Soviet republic, DPA reports. Many of those who advocated the coup see the separatist Stepan Bandera as an inspiration, and Viktor Yanukovych would not be toppled without these ultra-nationalists and, partially, assault groups, the agency believes.

http://en.itar-tass.com/world/723363

Philip · Post by **Philip** » 14 Mar 2014 00:42

O'Bomber,Kerrry.Cameron,Merkel,et al are nothing more than venal,amoral,immoral war criminals. They have an excellent track record already in the killing fields of Iraq,Afghanistan,Pakistan,the countries of the "Arab Spring" and now playing the same game in the Ukraine.clashes.

http://rt.com/news/kiev-clashes-rioters-police-571/

Donetsk clashes.
The standoff continues in Ukraine, as the defiant region of Crimea prepares for its upcoming referendum that will decide its status. The coup-imposed government has cut off financial links to Crimea, but has pledged not to attack the peninsula militarily.

Thursday, March 13
19:46 GMT:

Clashes erupted in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk after participants of a pro-Russian rally broke through a police cordon surrounding the rally of Ukraine’s integrity supporters. According to Interfax-Ukraine, law enforcers attempted to take those rallying for Ukrainian unity in police buses but some of the buses were blocked and had their windows broken. Fireworks and smoke grenades were also reportedly used in clashes.
18:02 GMT:

Russia has voiced support for the deployment of an OSCE monitoring mission in Ukraine, including Crimea, the chairman of the European security group said on Thursday, calling this a possible "big step forward."

"The Russian Federation supported the idea of a rapid approval and rapid deployment of a special monitoring mission for Ukraine," Thomas Greminger, Switzerland's ambassador to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, told reporters after a meeting of OSCE envoys in Vienna. (Reuters)

16:21 GMT:

Nearly 10,000 people in the city of Ulyanovsk have attended a rally in support of Ukraine’s Russian-speaking population.

TSJones · Post by **TSJones** » 14 Mar 2014 06:41

Russia is preparing to invade eastern Ukraine. Senora Merkel, she don't like it man.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/ ... E820140314

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 14 Mar 2014 07:10

What's POTUS BO waiting for? It's like I said: should have sent in the 101st to hold the bridges across the Dnieper so the Neo-Nazis can make it safely back with their ~~loot~~rightful possessions. Every passing hour increases the number of Russian tanks and helicopters ready to move. Incidentally, I bet the Belgians, Poles, Byelorussians, Norwegians and Swedes love this statement:

We would not only see it, also as neighbors of Russia, as a threat.

I thought the neighborliness ended circa 1944? Getting a bit uppity, isn't the 5th Reich?

vina · Post by **vina** » 14 Mar 2014 07:14

TSJones wrote:Russia is preparing to invade eastern Ukraine. Senora Merkel, she don't like it man.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/ ... E820140314

Ach! Frau Merkel, Bitte.

But all the same, the Oeiro e-con-omee will be doing soo-side. Not good news for the PIIGS (heavily dependent on Russian gas, esp southern europe), Germany will go down the Pakistan if there are any serious sanctions, and if Germany goes down Pakistan, the rest of Europe quickly follows and expect all the feel good "recovery" (if one can call what is happening in US that) in the US will quickly follow down Pakistan, and all the strategic goals in Afghanistan, Iran , Syria etc permanently shot.

Back to 'Helicopter' Ben's playbook I suppose. Run the printing presses full speed. Pump it up!

Like in the comedy show. I am Hans, and this is my Broder Franz. Together we pump it up Ja?

Hans and Franz

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 14 Mar 2014 07:30

Why is Russia focusing only on Crimea, not the rest of Ukraine east of the Dnieper? Like, Kharkiv, Poltava, Lebedin, Boryspil? Would be interesting to have a few divisions of vodka supplies right across the river from Kiev, so the Neo-Nazis won't have any trouble "going" regularly every morning?

member_28502 · Post by **member_28502** » 14 Mar 2014 07:50

I agree the best option for Russia is to make Ukraine land locked country and third of its size taking away the East South East and North east.

Israel has annexed East Jerusalem, Golan Heights etc
PRC has annexed Tibet and Parts of Kashmir Ladakh Aksai Chin
Pakistan has annexed Kashmir

Might is always right...

Paul · Post by **Paul** » 14 Mar 2014 08:24

^^^ It would be a stretch for Russia to take away Odessa port.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 14 Mar 2014 08:46

UlanBatori wrote:Why is Russia focusing only on Crimea, not the rest of Ukraine east of the Dnieper? Like, Kharkiv, Poltava, Lebedin, Boryspil? Would be interesting to have a few divisions of vodka supplies right across the river from Kiev, so the Neo-Nazis won't have any trouble "going" regularly every morning?

Perhaps because Crimea is mostly ethnic Russians so the support base is large and the infra available to deploy troops exist ... not a single person killed so far implies that they have a great support base.

For the rest it wont be easy and politically not sustainable

Found a good link on how Russia gains from Crimea

25+ Things Russia Gets with Incorporating of Crimea

UlanBatori · Post by **UlanBatori** » 14 Mar 2014 08:47

Paul, why, if Crimea decides to join? (with enthusiastic help of vodka-carriers)? Russians have now total Naval superiority in Black Sea area.

Paul · Post by **Paul** » 14 Mar 2014 09:27

N^3 Saar:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Odesa ... e28cf2176c

Odessa is not in Crimean peninsula per this map and also is not in the scope of the referendum. It is a good 50 - 100 miles drive (M17) from the Crimean peninsula. As such I think Russians could have problems keeping the road from Crimea to Odessa open if bullets start flying. Rumania is part of NATO and NATO planes flying off Rumanian airfields can challenge Russian basings the Black sea. Turkey is also in NATO.

Logistics wise NATO has a few options in case they want to challenge Russia in the Black sea.

Shreeman · Post by **Shreeman** » 14 Mar 2014 09:33

ok, speak up! Which one of you needed thge 33 tons of gold in such a hurry? Its no wedding season as far as I see.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 14 Mar 2014 09:36

A Nuclear Ukraine

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 14 Mar 2014 09:42

Austin wrote: Found a good link on how Russia gains from Crimea
25+ Things Russia Gets with Incorporating of Crimea

That's a huge amount of industry on a small island! There's clearly a lot more there than a naval port and a bunch of roads.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 14 Mar 2014 09:44

abhishek_sharma wrote:A Nuclear Ukraine

What a mess.

Austin · Post by **Austin** » 14 Mar 2014 09:58

I wonder what happens if majority in referendum votes to join Russia ( along with the other option to remain independent ) and Russia chooses not to do so but opt for Crimea to remain independent states ?

kmkraoind · Post by **kmkraoind** » 14 Mar 2014 19:16

This the link in that tweet